The experimental music studio?

You may recall all the drama around Christmas with deliveries of yet more equipment with fantastic names (moowoosher, minisomething or other the force and a huge keyboard with stand in it’s own special metal case). Well it is now March and the studio is almost clear. It was an experiment and, mmmmh, it became a loadstone of wires. The Synth Lover was not inspired and the beautiful music he had intended to make never flowed. However as with all experiences in life, if it doesn’t work, let go and move on. Or in this case find all the boxes and packaging and get on ebay. Ebb and, flow, in letting go of the need for an entire room devoted to synths and their accessories a Sound Force station with beautiful live accessory (cat) has meant an outpouring of amazing tunes! So that’s all good then (ref. to 2012 UK comedy).

 

 

On the island, the Season has begun.

It was with great amusement that I watched the arrivals streaming out of the wee airport and being met by a Saga (hols for oldies) Representative. Upon leaving school I did not want or qualify to go to University and so thrust myself into the ‘workforce’ with a series of part-time jobs whilst doing a Youth training Scheme in Travel and Tourism on the South Coast of England.

In those days airline and boat tickets were written BY HAND, you had to go through a travel agent in order to book anything. Package holidays by Intasun and Thompsons were offering affordable foreign holidays to the masses! We learned to issue train tickets (whose time tables were massive books reissued each year), work as a travel agent and over one week in Benidorm, how to be a ‘rep’. The only thing we did on a computer was to learn how to make a spreadsheet in the second half of the course for one day!

Being the gregarious big mouth that I am I was naturally drawn more to the meet and greet aspect rather than the 9-5 Travel Agency employee number. Handy really, as a few years later the internet blossomed. The middle man (travel agent) was cut from the equation and now most of it is done online – even checking in and printing boarding passes. My people skills honed from years of doing seasons of Sand followed by Ski as a rep gave me the public speaking skills that have provided for my creative expression and spondoolies too!

In fact one of my most lucrative season was for Saga’s American wing, Globus Gateway. We would collect the people from the airport, flog them excursions, take them to the theatre and get lots of tips. I was able to finance 6 months in Australia from 3 months work in London. Nice.

 

Anyway back to the Island, I was seeing off a friend and had prepared a little on board healthy breakfast tray. She was ever so pleased and snuffled the lot before we even got to the departures area! What a nice compliment for my ‘thrown together from whatever is to hand cake’.

This months recipe is from a real food blog, in case anyone is taking a plane journey and is looking for nibble inspiration….

from peacefuldumpling

Leave it to an English major to find recipe inspiration in the diary of a poet’s sister. Dorothy Wordsworth, sister of Tintern Abbey poet William Wordsworth, was an avid diarist–and a poet herself. She wrote of life in the Lake District of northern England where the natural landscape infused day-to-day life with quiet beauty.

Oat cakes are among the food items mentioned in Dorothy’s journals. Made with simple oat flour and goose fat, they could be easily packed along a trip outdoors. The recipe-adapting English major mentioned above was not me, but my mother. She experimented with blender-churned oat flour and different nut butters (not goose fat ;)) to create her own version of these delightful, healthy snacks.

Vegan Oatcakes

Ingredients:

(Makes between 10-12, depending on thickness of cakes.)

1/4 teaspoon sea salt

1 1/2 cup oat flour (can be made by blending old fashioned oats until they are a coarse flour)

1 tbsp. almond butter or coconut oil

1 tsp. baking powder

1 tsp. cinnamon or pumpkin spice blend

1/3 cup non-dairy milk or water (I used a blend of almond and coconut milk.)

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 tbsp. coconut nectar

cinnamon and almond slices for garnish (optional)

Directions:

1.  Pre-heat oven to 350F.

2. In a large bowl, mix dry ingredients.

3. In a separate bowl, mix wet ingredients then add to dry ingredients and stir thoroughly.

4.  Line a cookie sheet with parchment. Flatten dough between 1/4-1/2″. Cut into circles using a biscuit or cookie cutter. Press almond slices onto oat cakes (optional). Garnish with cinnamon (optional).

5. Bake for 15 minutes or until oat cakes easily lift off the parchment.  Allow cakes to cool on a wire rack. Serve, and enjoy!

 

On the video front, this month I have chosen the Emoto water walk for your enjoyment!